The present invention generally relates to methods and apparatus for making snow, and more particularly relates to a low energy snow making gun useful for making snow at ski resorts.
Snow making guns are known for making snow along ski slopes to maintain the slopes at their optimum condition for skiers. Snow guns operate by propelling water droplets into the air which collide with a plume generated by compressed air and atomized water whereupon the droplets form snow flakes that fall onto the slopes. Smaller snow guns which consume less energy than the large snow guns are more desirable as energy costs continue to rise. Prior art low energy guns have many problems including, for example, freezing of the components which have geometries allowing ice to collect on and in the gun, parts which are not easily removable and replaceable for servicing, limited snow throwing power due to a lack of controlled directionality and interference between the streams generated from the various nozzles, and low snow output as related to power consumption. For example, prior art snow guns use single nozzles each having large water outlet diameters which converge their output streams very close to the gun. This causes the streams to immediately lose momentum and directionality. There therefore remains a need for an improved low energy snow making gun which addresses the drawbacks of the prior art.